


of all the strangers, you're the strangest that I see

by homelywenchsociety



Series: graceland [1]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Medieval, Arranged Marriage, Emotional Baggage, F/M, Introspection, Light Angst, Marriage Proposal, Miscommunication, Political Alliances, Post-Revolution
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-18 05:28:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13675197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/homelywenchsociety/pseuds/homelywenchsociety
Summary: “But that’s the idea behind this whole concept, isn’t it? Everyone is being taken advantage of, and everyone gets something out of it. You’re using me for my aristocratic family name, to keep the old guard happy, and I...”She hesitates and Cassian is suddenly desperate to know what she thinks she’ll be getting out of their marriage. “And you…?” He prompts.Jyn’s eyes sharpen as they look upon him. He’s hit upon some useful information she didn’t intend to give him, and she resents him for it. “And I,” she begins again, “will have the security that comes with being the wife of a high-ranking member of the new regime.”[Jyn and Cassian are forced to marry for the good of the realm. Literally.]





	of all the strangers, you're the strangest that I see

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CrimsonPetrichor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrimsonPetrichor/gifts).



> As you might have guessed from the absolutely nonsensical tags on this story, I have little to no idea how to describe this thing. I’ve been referring to it as a vaguely Medieval Fantasy AU for so long that I’ll probably keep calling it that, for all it has no fantasy elements and little to no medieval elements. Just your standard “We overthrew an unjust government and all we got was this stupid arranged marriage” fic.
> 
> This is part one of a series, but later installments will play just as fast and loose with the idea of world building (spoiler alert: I’m bad at that and there will be none) as this one does, and it’s intended to be a series of loosely connected one-shots rather than a chronological, progressive narrative. So, I don’t know, get hyped for that...someday.
> 
> I wrote this as a friend-iversary gift for my gal Z, who has encouraged this idea since the moment I started screaming into her inbox about it. She deserves at least half credit for it, at this point, and future installments would not be possible without her indispensable advice. Thanks for all the friendship and the virtual hand-holding and the tonally inappropriate Taylor Swift lyrics!
> 
> Title comes from Lord Huron.

The door closes with a heavy thud and Cassian runs a hand over his forehead, trying to clear his mind now that the room he’s been in for over an hour is finally, blissfully silent. He can’t see anything now that he’s rubbing his eyes, but he hears, almost distantly, the rustle of his companion’s skirts and the creak of a chair that might be hers or might be his, he doesn’t know. He presses on his eyelids until he sees spots, and then takes another moment to calm down.

 

After his moment is up, Cassian withdraws his hands from his face and places them carefully on the table, giving the action at least three times more attention than it deserves. It helps, though, sometimes, to break a task that he’s dreading up into smaller tasks. First, he had to collect his thoughts, which he had not actually done but he’s pretending he has. Now, he has to sit up straight, not fidget with his hands, and project an air of casual indifference as he talks to Jyn Erso about their impending marriage.

 

When he actually looks at her, she’s turned slightly away from him, looking towards the door through which all of their companions have recently departed, and he finds himself growing irritated with the long line of her neck, from her clavicle to her raised chin. He merely pretends at the art of indifference, whereas she has achieved complete mastery of it. Here, in this moment, he resents her for it. Actually, he has resented her for it since their meeting began and various people, ranging from her brother to his commanding officer as well as several other prominent members of their new Republic, passionately debated the various advantages and disadvantages of an arranged marriage between himself and Lady—sorry, _Miss_ Erso.

 

It takes some reminding, even for someone such as himself who has been fighting for the dissolution of the monarchy in his country for as long as he can remember, that their efforts have succeeded and they are all now the citizens of a democratic republic where he does not have to refer to anyone as _lady_ or _lord_. For all his disdain for the aristocracy, the instinct to defer to those old titles and the etiquette that goes along with them runs deep. It’s harder with the Princess than with anyone else, but the combination of unfamiliarity and the haughtiness she wears around like armor makes him trip over what to call the woman in front of him as well.

 

 _Jyn_ is probably best. She will, in all likelihood, be his wife after all, and who could blame him for calling his wife by her first name? The old insecurities die hard, though, and he feels presumptuous and out-of-sorts even thinking of her as such. He has not even secured her hand in marriage yet and already he feels entitled to call her by her given name. _Miss Erso_ is somehow both too formal and too familiar all at once. Before the revolution, she would have been well above his station, and as such he never would have dared to call her _miss_ . But, in his youth, there were certainly women of his acquaintance whom he should have referred to in such terms out of respect for their unmarried status and he never bothered. He’d have been mocked mercilessly if he had, accused of putting on airs around people of his own class. And, of course, _Lady Erso_ is no one. It _was_ her mother, but she’s dead now, and there’s no aristocracy for her daughter to belong to anymore. It would in all likelihood cause more problems than it would solve to call her by that name.

 

It is because of this anxiety over titles and tradition and respect for the old ways that Cassian is even in this situation in the first place. The revolution was a success, the Emperor was dethroned, and the worst of his supporters were done away with, but now comes the hard part. _It is so easy to tear things down that we often forget how hard it is to build them back up_ , he thinks to himself, and the words sound like his mother’s voice. The rebellion was not easy, by any standards, and their new government was hard won, but Cassian recognizes, more so than his younger, more idealistic compatriots, that most of the hard work is still before them. And some of that hard work will apparently involve him marrying a member of the aristocracy to soothe the worries of the former ruling class.

 

A decent amount of the aristocracy was surprisingly sympathetic to the revolution, mostly because the Emperor had done such a thorough job of alienating even those who would normally align themselves with the Crown. Now that all was said and done, those same aristocrats were loudly voicing concerns about their role in the new government and concessions had to be made in order to secure their continued support. The idea was put forth that alliances, in the form of marriage, between members of the former aristocracy and highly ranked members of the New Republic would go far in allaying the fears of the old ruling class. It had seemed like a good idea to Cassian at the time—it still does, if he’s being honest—he just never thought he would be called upon to do it himself.

 

It wasn’t hypocrisy that made him think think this. He did not expect others make sacrifices while he did nothing, after all. If anything, he is surprised he’s considered highly ranked enough to be even considered for such a match. But he supposes he is close enough with the General and with Mon Mothma that they would consider him a good choice for one of these strategic marriages.

 

It is something of a comfort that Jyn herself strikes him as an odd choice for such a match as well. The Ersos, as he understands it, were a good family, but not highly respected at Court. They were considered by many to be unsophisticated, as their estate was in the farming province of Lah’mu, and snobbish, as they rarely made appearances in Court. It was not an endearing combination to the others of their class, who bristled at being rejected by such provincial people. The only one of them that was well known in the Capital was their patriarch, Galen, who wanted to give the appearance of supporting the Emperor but who always looked so miserable to be present that he might as well have not shown up at all. Once the war started in earnest, Galen remained in the Capital to develop weaponry for the Imperialists but it was a poorly kept secret that he was sympathetic with the rebellion.

 

Cassian knows all of this, and more, about the Ersos partly from his time as a spy, but also because, in spite of the disdain the Old Court had for the family—or perhaps because of it—they became the center of much gossip during the war. And it’s not hard to see why. Galen’s wife Lyra was worse than her husband at masking her hatred of the Emperor and made almost no appearances in Court for that very reason. She was a practitioner of the Old Religion, and vocal about it too, which did very little endear her to the Crown. No one could ever prove that her death, which happened just as the rebellion was starting to gain traction, was ordered by the Emperor, but it is widely believed to be true, nonetheless.

 

As for Galen and Lyra’s children, there is no shortage of gossip surrounding them. Cassian has seen them, Jyn and her brother, as they pass through the halls of the former castle that now acts as the seat of their new Republic. They are inseparable now that the war is over and they are reunited. They walk around, arms linked, in a world unto themselves, oblivious to the way rumors chase at their heels like hounds. There are whispers about both of them and the things they did during the war that they show no signs of acknowledging one way or another. For one thing, it is widely known that, if they are anything to each other, they can only possibly be half-siblings. Jyn’s brother Bodhi does not even bear the Erso name, and there are stories, some of them nasty and some of them almost mythical, as to how he came to live with the Ersos. Many suspect he’s a bastard of Galen’s, taken in and raised as a ward to protect his wife’s feelings. No one dares say this in front of Jyn, however, for fear of inciting her legendary wrath when it comes to her brother. For that is what she always refers to and treats him as, her brother.

 

Jyn’s history, too, is the subject of much gossip. While there are no suspicions about the legitimacy of her birth, rumors swirl about what she was doing during the war, who she was with, where she was, and even who she was. After the death of her mother, Jyn Erso disappeared. For years, she was presumed dead by the Imperialists, but they pursued every rumor, every whisper of a child matching her description in order to keep her father motivated to work for them. The promise of someday finding his daughter was enough to keep him on the side of the people he hated.

 

Looking across the table at the woman he’s supposed to marry, Cassian can’t decide if he believes anything he’s heard about her or not. There are rumors she trained with Saw Gerrera and his band of renegade soldiers. There are rumors she was a criminal, stealing supplies from the Imperialists and the Rebels alike, aligning herself with no one. Some say she was a spy, and the reason the Imperialists could never find her was because she changed names and identities at every turn, constantly becoming someone new. It’s that last one that bothers Cassian the most, he thinks. The other rumors are concerning, but she is here now. Maybe her only loyalty is to her brother, but he’s a war hero, a big deal amongst the Rebels, and he’s not going anywhere. It’s part of the reason Cassian thinks she was chosen for such an arrangement, being the sister of a living legend and all. It’s enough for most people to forget her family’s reputation for their rather cryptic allegiances in the past. If Cassian is any good at reading people—and he likes to think he is—he thinks Jyn Erso is on their side now. Whether she was in the past or not is something he will have to refrain from worrying over, for there is nothing he can do about it either way.

 

No, what truly worries him is that perhaps he’s being negotiated into marriage with someone exactly like himself. How will two people accustomed to hiding behind false identities and scavenging their every interaction for information they can use to their advantage later ever manage to be husband and wife to one another? He tries, as he looks at her, to imagine it: this woman being his wife, taking his name, sharing his bed, perhaps someday being the mother of his children. He cannot begin to picture it. He tries and fails to remember his parents together, what they were like, but it’s been too long. He lost his mother when he was young and his father when he was even younger. He cannot produce a single memory of them as a couple. How can he be someone’s husband, when he does not know what that means?

 

The room they are in is suddenly too warm and too small and Cassian stands up hurriedly. The scrape of his chair on the stone floor draws Jyn’s attention to him, although he suspects she’s been watching him out of the corner of her eye all along. Something about her eyes is unnerving to him; how luminous they are, how no detail escapes them. He’d been looking at her for a long while, but she’d done nothing, she hadn’t spoken or even looked his way. She’s waiting him out, he realizes. It’s something he knows too from being a spy: if you speak first, you’re at a disadvantage from the start.

 

 _But we’re not at war anymore_ , he thinks, and decides they’ve been silent long enough.

 

“We can tell them ‘no’,” he says, and he’s surprised by the words as soon as they’re out of his mouth. Not because he had any better ideas of what to say in his head, but more so that he actually managed to speak at all.

 

“We can?” Jyn asks, blinking in what’s probably supposed to look like surprise. Cassian sees the artifice in it, and hears the condescension in her tone, like she knows he’s wrong but isn’t ready to tell him yet.

 

“Of course,” he says, huffing. “You don’t have to marry me. They could find someone else, someone willing.”

 

“I’m willing,” she says, lifting her chin defiantly.

 

“Could have fooled me.”

 

Jyn’s answering smile contains no warmth. “It’s an arranged marriage, Captain,” she says, putting some sarcastic emphasis on his title. He pushes down the impulse to let it to raise his hackles. “You’ll excuse me if I don’t burst into song at the prospect.”

 

“Your brother does not seem inclined towards the match,” he says, ignoring most of what she’s just said.

 

“My brother is overprotective,” Jyn answers, unperturbed. “But it’s not up to him.”

 

“He wants to make sure you’re not being taken advantage of,” Cassian says, looking at the sill of the window as he leans back against it. Unconsciously, he’s put as much distance between himself and Jyn as possible. He hopes she hasn’t noticed.

 

“Well, of course I am,” she says, simply. “But that’s the idea behind this whole concept, isn’t it? Everyone is being taken advantage of, and everyone gets something out of it. You’re using me for my aristocratic family name, to keep the old guard happy, and I...”

 

She hesitates and Cassian is suddenly desperate to know what she thinks she’ll be getting out of their marriage. “And you…?” He prompts.

 

Jyn’s eyes sharpen as they look upon him. He’s hit upon some useful information she didn’t intend to give him, and she resents him for it. “And I,” she begins again, “will have the security that comes with being the wife of a high-ranking member of the new regime.”

 

“Your brother objects to you having security?”

 

“Of course not,” she says, rolling her eyes. “He objects to me marrying someone I do not love. He’s a romantic.”

 

“And you’re not?” Cassian asks, keeping his voice even. It’s not meant to be a leading question, but he can see how it could be mistaken for one. He just wants to know what to expect from her, if such a thing is even possible.

 

“No,” she says, and she’s searching his face for a reaction. Finding none, she continues, “I was raised to expect such a thing. My parents had an arranged marriage, as well as most of the other married people I knew. It does not mean they were unhappy. That depends entirely on the people.”

 

Cassian wants to ask if she thinks they could be happy, but it feels like too vulnerable a thing to ask. Besides, the end goal of this is not for them to be happy, but for their marriage to strengthen the alliance between the disparate factions of the rebellion. If the marriage works on a personal level, it will be viewed as an unexpected stroke of good fortune. But whether they are actually well-suited for one another is not the main concern of those in charge.

 

Cassian must lose a minute thinking on this, because he’s startled to hear the creak of Jyn’s chair as it’s pushed back. When he looks up, she’s standing beside the table, watching him intently. “In fact, Captain,” she says, “I’d say the only person in this room who needs convincing is you.”

 

Cassian shakes his head at her, but it’s half-hearted, at best. He’s too distracted watching her approach him. “Your friends didn’t seem convinced it was a good idea, marrying me,” she says, walking towards him slowly.

 

“Friend. Just the one.”

 

“He doesn’t trust me, I take it.”

 

“Kay doesn’t trust anyone,” Cassian says, trying to sound easy and missing the mark slightly. She’s right in front of him now, and her close proximity is unnerving him. “I wouldn’t take it personally.”

 

Jyn makes a _tsk_ noise in the back of her throat that feels decidedly like play-acting to him and reaches for his hand where it rests on the windowsill. It takes everything in him not to jump at the unexpected contact, but he manages it, barely. She turns over his hand so she can study his palm. “If it’s not his opinion you’re worried about, then what?” She asks, not looking up.

 

“I’m not worried,” he lies.

 

“I would be a good wife to you, Captain,” she says, and he doesn’t miss the way her voice drops, the emphasis she puts _just so_ on the exact right words for the utmost effect. She runs her pointer finger along the crease of the third finger of his left hand, right where a wedding band would go and he has to rein in a shudder. He gets the distinct feeling he’s being seduced, or laughed at, or perhaps both. The impulse to pull his hand away, to put as much space between them as possible, is a strong one, a good one, even, but he doesn’t indulge it. Jyn must sense some hesitation on his part, because she adds, in a questioning tone, “Although, maybe, I am not your type. Perhaps, when you pictured your wife, you pictured her differently...”

 

It’s as clear an opening to compliment her as he’s ever heard, but he finds himself taking her implied question seriously instead. He tries to remember, as a kid, what he’d thought about marriage, if he’d ever imagined the kind of woman he’d marry, and comes up empty. As he’s gotten older, as the war dragged on, he pushed such matters, on the rare occasion when they arose, to the back of his mind. There have been women he liked, women he found beautiful and interesting, women he probably could have married. But it never occurred to him. He’s been fighting a war for so long he never stopped to think of the future like that. It’s fitting that the only thing that ever made him consider marriage was being asked to do so by his superiors. He almost wants to laugh at the absurdity of it all.

 

The war has taken so much from him, more than he realizes most days. His marriage might be a strategic move for the benefit of the New Republic, but he and his wife needn’t carry on as if they are still players in a war. He refuses to weigh every word and action for its strategic benefit, to view every admission as ground lost. This meeting is not a battle, his marriage will not be a war, and his wife is not his enemy. He knows very little about being a husband, but he does know that. If he wants anything out of a potential wife, it’s that she feels the same way. Maybe Jyn doesn’t feel that way yet, but he thinks they could get there. He thinks that they deserve some peace at long last, and it would be an honor to give that to her. There are surely men who could give her more romance, more money, more everything. The least he can give her is his honesty.

 

“Can I tell you the truth?” He asks, with this in mind, turning his hand so he captures hers.

 

She looks up at him, surprised, and he meets her gaze steadily. “Of course,” she says, and she really is beautiful, he thinks as he takes her in, and she’s certainly interesting. There are many who would look at her and assume he chose her for the reasons men often choose wives. He could never be accused of choosing poorly for himself if he does marry her, and if their conversation is any indication, he will certainly never be bored with her. He knows her to be fierce and strong, pragmatic and kind with those she loves. He respects her and wishes to know her better. It’s not quite affection, and it certainly isn’t love, but he knows he would be lucky to be her husband.

 

“You want to know what I imagined when I thought about my marriage,” Cassian says, looking once again at their joined hands. “I didn’t. I never imagined it.”

 

“No?” Jyn asks, quietly, all the pretense gone from her voice.

 

“I never imagined I’d live long enough for it to matter,” he says, just as quiet, a secret just for her and this room to know.

 

“Well, Captain,” she says, the words rushing out on an exhale, “we have that in common, at least.”

 

She sounds relieved, genuine, for the first time since their meeting began. He allows himself to smile at that and pull her hand that he’s still holding close enough that he can plant a kiss on her palm. “Consider me convinced, then,” he says and hopes she knows what he means. Her answering smile tells him she does, and they stay like that, holding hands in the quiet room, for a while yet.

  



End file.
